Here's what happened: Way back in late 2010 when Comic-Con 2011 tickets were going on sale many of my LOSTArgs Twitter friends encouraged me to try for tickets. They were thinking of some sort of LOST-themed get-together in San Diego. I'm not much for travel and as much as I wanted to meet everyone in person, it just seemed like a lot of expense and effort. Over the next few months it became clear that many of my closest LOSTArgs pals had secured Comic-Con passes. I also learned that in addition to the San Diego leg of the trip, there would also be a few folks heading to Oahu afterward. A Skype session with @Lottery_Ticket in February 2011 finally convinced me that this would be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and could not be missed. I booked my tickets to San Diego & Oahu. I didn't mind at all that I didn't have Comic-Con passes -- there was so much awesome on the table that I wouldn't even miss it!
As July approached I started to have a niggling feeling that it would actually be kind of cool to at least get a glimpse of Comic-Con. The addition of an EW LOST panel to the agenda provided extra incentive. When 4-day resale passes went up I managed to get into the queue, but JUST missed out (by four thousand fans or so). Somehow I completely missed the notice for 1-day resale passes. Oh well, I thought, no Comic-Con for me but there would still be a boatload of joy to experience. I also learned of and signed up for panels featuring Jorge Garcia and Dominic Monaghan outside of Comic-Con proper.
Then on July 19th (again, less than 24 hours before leaving!) I received word form a friend that a 4-day pass with preview night had become available. Would I be interested. J'ya! And with that I was suddenly going to Comic-Con! I am eternally grateful to my fellow LOST fan who offered up this wonderfully geektastic opportunity.
I don't have too many shots from inside Comic-Con -- lots of that to see on the Internet -- but did take some shots around the Convention Center and throughout San Diego's downtown area showing the extent to which Comic-Con has taken over the city. It's really quite amazing.
I couldn't resist taking these shots of two highly-detailed Enterprise models featured at the QMX booth. Beautiful to behold, with a price tag to match their grandeur.
I also couldn't resist (re-)taking the iconic SDCC shot within the convention center.
Although I found the convention center busy, it didn't come across to me as scary-busy except for a couple of moments in the exhibition hall when fans congregated around one or the other booths clogged up the passageway.
I spent some time with @MegoScott on the floor scoping out merchandise including a few booths with Mego toys. We checked out the new Bif Bang Pow! wares at the Entertainment Earth booth. He also introduced me to a few of the folks he knows.
Generally speaking I'm very bad at noticing things happening around me, but I did see a few familiar faces at the con. I passed by Lou Ferrigno on the exhibtion floor. I saw Patricia Tallman and Erin Gray in the autograph booths. I also had a chat, I think it was with Danny Hicks, who has appeared in several of Sam Raimi's movies. He seemed like a great guy, though he noted that booth action was a little slow that morning. I also could have sworn I walked past Justin Timberlake in downtown SD. A few hours afterward I learned that JT was in San Diego for the con, so more than likely it was him. I was also introduced to the artist Kevin Tong by a couple of my Barracks-mates who had met him before.
One evening a group of us dropped by the Jay & Jack party at Tivoli's for a bit. I spotted Jack (or was it Jay? Jeez, it's Scott and Steve all over again) and also Kris White who hosted the LOST official podcast. We also experienced a young man challenging Superman to a push-up contest. Silly fool -- you don't mess with a son of Krypton! Supes won handily.
Two photos below courtesy @zort70
Despite all the goodness above, the highlight of Comic-Con 2011 for me was LOST panel featuring two surprise guests and several awesome audience members. Stay tuned -- same bat time, same bat channel, for that tale.
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